Becoming a Heavenly Human in a Single Night!
Chen Du caught up with Grandma halfway there. Leaning on her bamboo cane, the old woman walked along the dirt road, her head covered in sweat and her cloth shoes caked with mud.
He spotted her hunched figure from afar, and the stone weighing on his heart finally fell.
He stayed out of sight and followed her from a distance, watching her enter the county town.
He watched her fumble the jade bracelet out of her cloth bundle and haggle with the pawnbroker at the counter.
The bracelet fetched less than two taels of silver scraps in the end, but Grandma was as happy as if she had found a treasure. She tucked the silver carefully inside her clothes.
Chen Du stood on a street corner, watching her small, thin figure weave through the crowd. Suddenly, his eyes began to sting.
He waited at the crossroads where Grandma would leave town, pretending he had just happened to arrive, then supported her as they walked home together.
Grandma scolded him all the way, saying he had disobeyed her and insisted on following. Had he fed the chickens? Had he warmed up Niuwa's lunch?
He answered each question: the chickens were fed, the food was warm, and Niuwa was at home doing his homework.
When they reached the mountain ridge at the entrance to the village, Chen Du suddenly stopped in his tracks.
Grandma was still chattering about which family's girl was good with her hands and whose daughter had a good temper, but he was not listening.
His gaze had passed over the ridge and settled on the distant place where the village should have been!
There, flames were soaring into the sky!
All of Qinghe Village was burning!
Thick smoke rose from the roof of every house like writhing black dragons, gathering in the air and staining the evening sky a dark red.
The stench of burning drifted through the air. Grandma's voice cut off abruptly. She followed Chen Du's gaze, and her whole body went limp, sliding down as though her bones had been pulled out.
Chen Du caught her, hoisted her onto his back, and sprinted toward the village.
But the village was already gone.
Half the mud-brick houses had burned and collapsed, and roof beams lay across the middle of the road, still crackling.
Corpses blocked the mouth of the well, and dark red blood spattered the stone rice mill.
Chicken and duck feathers were scattered across the ground, matted together in clumps by bloody water.
He saw Wang Tiezhu sprawled across his own threshold, several holes stabbed through his back.
He saw Li Erniu lying beneath the great locust tree, his eyes wide open and a clean cut across his throat.
He saw Auntie Wang, still clutching three-year-old Xiaohu tightly in her arms. Mother and son had been pinned together by a spear.
He saw Mr. Wang, the private tutor who had taught Niuwa to recite the "Thousand Character Classic." He had died beside his own desk, torn textbooks scattered near his hand.
He knew every one of them. He could put a name to every face.
Every one of them had greeted him that morning, chatted with him, borrowed farm tools, or shared tobacco leaves.
Now they lay scattered across the ground like discarded rag dolls!
Their blood had soaked the dirt road dark brown.
For the first time, Chen Du felt such suffocation. It seemed that because he had lived here for over three years, he had grown numb to a certain extent, grown accustomed to comfort, and never expected this outcome.
When some people's hearts grew complacent, their entire bodies would rot... even the killing intent they possessed would be frozen solid!
Grandma slid down from his back and stumbled toward the corpses.
She did not cry or shout. She simply knelt on the ground and reached out with her callused hands to check each person for breath.
She checked one, and her hands trembled.
She checked another, and her hands trembled again.
At last, her hand came to rest on Xiaohu's face in Auntie Wang's arms. Huzi's eyes were still half open.
Grandma wiped the blood from Xiaohu's face with her sleeve,
but no matter how many times she wiped, she could not get it clean.
Chen Du's heart gave a violent twitch.
Niuwa!
He spun around and rushed to his own courtyard. Two of the three mud-brick rooms had collapsed, half the courtyard wall had fallen, and only half a charred trunk remained of the great locust tree.
The fire in the kitchen was still burning, and the porridge in the pot had been reduced to charcoal.
Chen Du tore through the broken bricks and tiles like a madman. His fingers sizzled from the heat, his nails peeled back, and blood ran down from his fingertips.
Then he saw the foot,
wearing a cloth shoe with a hole in it and a crooked little flower embroidered on the toe.
Grandma had made it for Niuwa at New Year last year.
Niuwa was curled up beneath a collapsed mud wall. He looked as though he had been struck hard by something, his chest caved in and bloody foam covering the corners of his mouth.
His eyes were still slightly open, his pupils unfocused.
But he was still alive... if that could still be called living.
Chen Du knelt and gathered his younger brother into his arms.
Niuwa's body was so light it seemed weightless, like holding a bundle of firewood about to fall apart.
Blood kept pouring from the corners of Niuwa's mouth, flowing over his chin and down his neck, staining the front of his clothes dark red.
Niuwa recognized him. His unfocused eyes suddenly cleared for an instant, and then he saw Grandma.
Grandma stumbled over and fell to her knees on the broken bricks. She reached out with her callused hands and shakily touched Niuwa's face.
The corners of Niuwa's mouth moved, as though he were smiling.
With the last of his strength, he spoke in broken breaths. "Grandma... brother..."
With those words, his hand slipped from the crook of Chen Du's arm.
Grandma took Niuwa from Chen Du and held him in her arms as though he were a sleeping child.
She did not cry or shout. She simply buried her head against her grandson's icy forehead, her shoulders shaking violently without a sound.
The silver scraps slipped from inside her clothes and rolled into the blood and ashes.
Grandma held Niuwa's corpse, kneeling in the middle of the burning village.
Her sobs were quiet, yet they were like a blunt knife, cutting into Chen Du's heart again and again.
"Niuwa... my Niuwa..." she repeated his name, her voice hoarse and broken. "You're only twelve... you never even had a proper meal..."
"Grandma was wrong... Grandma shouldn't have gone to town... if only Grandma had taken you with her... why did Grandma leave you home alone..."
She suddenly raised her head and looked around blankly.
Firelight reflected in her clouded eyes, illuminating the wrinkles on her face like dried-up riverbeds.
She saw Chen Du, yet seemed not to see him.
She opened her mouth in a smile uglier than tears. "Old man? Have you come to take me with you? Look, I brought our Niuwa... I didn't take good care of him... don't blame me..."
She looked down at Niuwa in her arms again and patted his back gently, as though soothing a child who refused to sleep. "Be good, Niuwa. Don't be afraid. Grandma's here. Grandma isn't going anywhere..."
Chen Du knelt beside Grandma, his heart being cut apart by knives.
Was this... heaven's punishment for him?
Why hadn't he taken Niuwa along?
He could have carried Niuwa on his back, taken Grandma by the hand, and gone to the county town together, all three of them returning safely. But he had not.
He had thought leaving Niuwa at home to do his homework was the safest arrangement.
Perhaps, for someone like him, a comfortable, peaceful life was like poison.
For the people of the world, it was like poison too.
Without realizing it, he had been poisoned deeply, poisoned to no small extent.
More than a dozen figures appeared in the firelight at the village entrance.
They wore the standard armor of the Yan Kingdom, with bloodstained gray feathers on their helmets and dripping swords in their hands.
These soldiers were stragglers who had slipped away to loot after the battle was over.
These men had killed until their eyes turned red on the battlefield. Once off it, they would casually slaughter a few villages, rob a few taels of silver, and kill a few unarmed farmers, then go back and boast of their valor to their comrades.
The bearded man leading them kicked a corpse aside, bent down, and tore a money pouch from its waist. He weighed it in his hand and tucked it inside his clothes with satisfaction.
Several soldiers behind him followed his example, rummaging through chests and cupboards and even stripping clothes from the dead to see if they had anything valuable.
Someone found half a jar of wine by the well, took a swig straight from it, and burst out laughing.
The firelight shone on their faces, making their grins look like those of a pack of evil ghosts crawling out of the earth!
Grandma's sobbing stopped abruptly when she heard their laughter. She raised her head and saw the armor, the swords, and the gray feathers on their helmets. She recognized their attire.
Twenty years ago, men dressed just like this had broken into her home and killed her daughter-in-law.
Today, men dressed just like this had killed her Niuwa.
She gently laid Niuwa on the ground, then stood up and screamed with all her might, "Give me back my Niuwa!"
She charged headfirst at the bearded leader.
That small, thin old woman was throwing herself with all her strength at a battle-hardened soldier of Yan.
"Grandma!" Chen Du lunged forward, trying to stop her.
But another group of soldiers suddenly poured out from the side. Four or five raised their swords and slashed at him at once.
He raised a hand to block. A sword struck his left arm, cutting into flesh before lodging against the bone.
He struck back with a palm and crushed the man's throat, but the men behind him pressed forward. At the same time, an arrow shot from the shadows, its tip piercing his right shoulder.
The tremendous impact made him stagger back several steps.
This body had only been crudely tempered for a few years and was still nowhere near able to withstand swords and blades head-on.
Those few steps were all it took! The bearded man did not even turn around. A seasoned old soldier behind him reacted with lightning speed, stepping forward and thrusting his spear before Grandma could reach the leader.
The spearpoint entered Grandma's back and came out through her chest, pinning her in place.
Grandma looked down at the bloody spearpoint protruding from her chest. Then her body went limp. She sank to her knees and slowly fell into a pool of blood, facing Niuwa.
Chen Du let out a roar, his voice cracking as he blasted the two soldiers blocking his way aside with a palm strike and stumbled to Grandma's side.
He turned her over and pressed both hands desperately against the hole in her chest, but blood kept pouring through his fingers. He could not stop it.
Grandma's eyes were still open, looking at him. He lowered his head and pressed his ear to her mouth, barely making out the few words she spoke in broken breaths. "Your father... still hasn't... come back..."
Then her eyes remained open just like that, and she moved no more.
Chen Du knelt on the ground, his arms hanging at his sides, blood dripping from his fingertips and nails into the dirt.
When the Yan soldiers saw that he was still alive, they cursed and closed in around him.
The bearded man drew the sword at his waist and brought it down toward the back of his neck.
Yet a quarter of an hour later, the soldiers' corpses lay scattered in pools of blood at the village entrance.
The bearded man's sword had been crushed into a lump of scrap iron. The veteran who had speared the old woman to death slumped against a broken wall, his neck twisted at an impossible angle.
And the archer who had shot from hiding had his bow snapped in two and an arrowhead embedded in his own throat.
Chen Du stood amid the pile of corpses, his hands hanging at his sides as his breathing gradually steadied.
The fire still burned, its crackling especially grating in the deathly silent village.
He turned and took two steps toward Grandma and Niuwa, then stopped.
He did not dare go over. He feared that if he saw those two cold bodies again, the fissure in his chest, just filled with anger, would burst open once more.
He had killed people, so very many people, but did it feel good?
He looked down at his blood-covered hands.
He slowly sank to his knees in the scorched earth. His knees struck broken bricks, but he felt nothing.
Firelight illuminated half his face; the other half lay hidden in shadow.
Wang Tiezhu, Li Erniu, Auntie Wang, Xiaohu, Mr. Wang... every face flashed through his mind, so clear.
Now they were all dead.
Everyone in this world who had known him, everyone who had called him "Gouwa," had become a cold corpse.
Chen Du stood, and the panel seemed to light up as well:
[Stunning Everyone with a Single Cry · Lie Dormant experience +1]
[Current progress: Lie Dormant Lv6 (123/124) → Lie Dormant Lv7 (0/248)]
[Lie Dormant has reached Lv7. Its effect has greatly increased, and its multiplier has risen from 6× to 7×. Current time spent dormant: three years... if the dormant state is lifted now, all emotion-based talent effects will receive a 6× boost.]
In the night wind, a figure stepped onto the dirt road heading north.
Behind him, the village flames burned ever fiercer in the darkness.
Chen Du headed north at an unhurried pace. His breathing was even, his pulse steady.
He saw wheat fields by the road trampled to pieces by horses' hooves,
saw fleeing civilians lying in the ditches, saw black smoke rising from distant villages?
Beneath every column of black smoke was another Qinghe Village.
His expression remained calm throughout, calm to the point of indifference.
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Enlightenment in Fire · Becoming an Immortal Through Anger experience +1]
[Current progress: Becoming an Immortal Through Anger Lv6 (123/124) → Becoming an Immortal Through Anger Lv7 (0/248)]
[Becoming an Immortal Through Anger has reached Lv7. Its effect has greatly increased, and all comprehension-type talent abilities will receive a 7× boost.]
[Synergy detected between "Becoming an Immortal Through Anger Lv7" and "Lie Dormant Lv7"--]
[Lie Dormant Lv7 current amplification multiplier: 7x.]
[Becoming an Immortal Through Anger Lv7 current amplification multiplier: 7x.]
[With their combined effects stacked, all comprehension and talent-type abilities will be amplified 49 times.]
[Remaining Lie Dormant time: lifted.]
Sometimes, a person's life, ten years or a hundred, passed as uneventfully as an instant.
Spring plowing and autumn harvests along the field ridges, simple meals before the hearth, gossip about family and neighbors beneath the locust tree.
Those days passed too quickly—so quickly that before he could take one more look at Niuwa, before he could listen to one more bit of Grandma's nagging, they were gone.
And for some, a moment's fury was enough to burn for a thousand years, a hundred years.
With a single thought of anger, a million gates of hindrance opened.
The anger in his heart today had opened far more than a million gates!
The night was black as ink. Chen Du followed the hoofprints and wagon ruts left by the Yan Kingdom's southern expeditionary army northward.
Corpses appeared by the roadside from time to time.
He did not stop. Beside a burned-out supply wagon, a battered book lay half-buried in the dirt.
A corner of its cover had burned away, but the pages inside were reasonably intact.
He bent down, picked it up, and brushed off the dust. By moonlight, he made out the crooked characters on the cover... "Soldier Body-Refining Art."
It was a basic cultivation method passed around in the army. The paper was coarse and the writing sloppy. Clearly, it was no closely guarded secret, but probably an introductory method the rank-and-file soldiers used to temper their bodies.
Chen Du opened the first page. Written in simple language were the words: "All who enter the army must first refine the body. Once body refinement bears fruit, one can lift a hundred jin and withstand ordinary blades, spears, and arrows. This is the peak of Mortal Rank, where most army centurions are found."
Below those few lines were a rudimentary breathing method and simple diagrams of several body-tempering movements.
What truly made him stop was a summary at the end of the preface.
Those words briefly outlined the Heavenly Human Realm's martial cultivation system... Mortal Rank, Profound Rank, Earth Tier, Saint Tier, and Heavenly Human.
These were the five great realms of the Heavenly Human Realm.
After a night had passed, Chen Du closed the "Soldier Body-Refining Art."
This rudimentary military cultivation method could only take one to the peak of Mortal Rank, but for him, that was enough.
Some people read books all their lives, yet it was as though they had never read a single page.
Others read only one page, yet surpassed those who had read all their lives!
From the smallest sign... one could discern the whole!
For Chen Du, a single look at the Heavenly Human Realm's martial arts was enough!
With Martial Arts Creation Lv7 bolstering him and his comprehension amplified forty-nine times, he worked his way along the framework of the cultivation method, fusing his accumulated martial knowledge from the Xuanye Realm and the Heavenly Human Realm's system of rules in a single furnace!
By daybreak, he had entered the Heaven-Human Realm.